Macaroni
by Redlance-ck
Summary: A peek behind the Luthor curtain. [One-shot]


Because Lena doesn't have walls, that's for sure. Written for a one-word prompt of the same name for a patron!

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Spending time at The Luthor Family Children's Hospital is one of Lena's absolute most favourite things to do. She adores it. Admittedly, and to her immense displeasure, she doesn't get to visit as often as she'd like, especially now she's taken on CatCo as well as still having her hand in L-Corp. Even so, she goes as often as she can.

The children there are remarkable. Each and every one of them. They show her what true bravery and strength look like. They remind her that every word of bad press and negativity is worth it if they are the stepping stones to this. To helping people.

Because that's all Lena wants to do. Whether the people of National City - or the world - believe her or not.

That's precisely why she's at the hospital today, after all. Lending a hand. Literally.

"Miss Lena?" Xander, a six-year-old boy battling leukemia, blinks up at her with big, brown, soulful eyes and she smiles at him.

"Yes, Mister Xander?" She glances down to where the young boy has his hand covering hers overtop a sheet of letter-size paper and watches him slowly pull his tiny hand back.

"You can move now." His eyes remain on the paper as Lena does as she's instructed and Xander lets out a happy giggle when he sees that he's drawn a complete outline of Lena's hand. He claps his hands wildly, one still holding the bright pink marker he'd used to create his masterpiece and Lena cheers.

"What's next?" She rests her elbow on her knee and leans forward a little, closing her hand into a fist and using it to prop her head up. Xander's brow furrows and there's a moment of silence where he stares down at his drawing. Lena watches him gesture with the marker, thinking, and then idly begin to bring it towards his face. Inch by inch, until Lena reaches out and uses the flat of her palm to gently urge his arm back down. "Markers are for paper," she reminds him.

"Not faces!" He giggles, finishing a mantra that has obviously been well practised.

"Good boy."

"I'm going to turn it into an alien," he announces, confidently, laying down the pink marker, capping it, and then picking up a green one. She commends him on his idea and tells him that she's going to go and see some of the other children, but promises to stop and say goodbye before she leaves.

She approaches a group of children sitting around an appropriately sized table and sees that they're also doing some kind of craft project. One of the girls notices her walking over and immediately causes a commotion among the group, whispering feverishly and causing the others to look over their shoulders.

"And what's going on over here?" Lena archly raises an eyebrow as she looks down at them, feigning genuine suspicion for all of five seconds before cracking a smile. The children giggle and start talking a mile a minute, all at the same time. Eventually, Lena is forced to shush them, and it takes a moment but eventually, they calm down long enough to show her what they're making. She pulls out an unoccupied chair that's far too small for her, but sits anyway, safe in the knowledge that she hasn't had one break under her yet. It must make for an amusing image, though.

There are bottles of white school glue and tubes of paint scattered across the table, which someone had the foresight to cover with newspaper beforehand. There's also an assortment of glitter, pipe cleaners, string, construction paper, and a number of other things, as well as a few dishes filled with varying sizes of macaroni.

"Miss Lena, look!" Rachel, a five-year-old with red hair and the soul of someone far beyond her few years, holds up a frame she's made with paint-covered hands. It's been constructed primarily out of cardboard, pieces of macaroni having been artfully glued down, painted, and then glittered for good measure.

"Excellent work, Rachel!" Lena claps her hands together once, holding them out in front of her as she leans forward to get a better look. "Do you know what photograph you're going to put in there yet?"

"Colin!" The girl answers, not missing a beat, and Lena gently furrows her brow before asking who Colin is. "My dog. Mommy's bringing me a picture later."

"Your… dog? Whose name is Colin." Lena's mouth quirks at the corners and she lets out a chuckle. "Lovely."

She looks over the projects that the two boys are working on, then arrives at the last person sitting at the table.

"Madeline." Seven, shy, cute as a button, and the earlier commotion-causer. She blushes deeply the moment Lena's eyes are on her. "What have you made?" Wide green eyes stare at Lena, darting away for a second and then back. Lena smiles, trying to encourage the girl, but Madeline only snaps her mouth shut and continues to stare.

"She made it for you," Rachel happily supplies from beside the other girl, gaining Madeline's attention for all of a heartbeat.

"She looooves you," one of the boys teases from his place across the table, making kissy sounds as he squirts half a bottle of glue onto a piece of paper.

"Felix." Lena's tone is reproachful, her frown one of discontent, and Felix mumbles an apology before dumping glitter onto his mess of glue. Shaking her head, Lena turns back to Madeline, whose blush has somehow deepened. "I'd love to see whatever it is." Now, her tone is gentle and calm. Patient, but also interested. Everything she'd wanted to hear from her own mother at Madeline's age.

It takes about thirty seconds, but finally, Madeline scoots her chair back a little and looks down at her lap. She lifts something up onto the table and places it carefully on the table in front of Lena.

It's a necklace. Made from alternating small and medium-sized pieces of macaroni, equally spaced, and threaded onto a long piece of string. Some of the pasta pieces have been painted gold, others a turquoise colour and silver glitter has been lightly dusted over the whole thing.

Lena feels her heart clench as she looks down at it. Sees the care and attention that has so obviously been spent on making it. It's messy and gaudy, and beautiful.

"Is this for me?" Lena asks, tapping one of the pieces to make sure the paint is dry and then picking up the necklace by either end of the string. Madeline nods, wordlessly, and Lena's smile stretches into a grin. She lifts the necklace then, reaching around the back of her head and tying the string into a knot. "I love it!" She looks down at where the necklace lies against her, touching it fondly before reaching across the table to pat Madeline's hand. "Thank you."

And Lena would wear a thousand macaroni necklaces if it would mean the children making them would wear the same kind of smile Madeline wears upon hearing Lena's words. Would radiate the same sense of happiness.

For that, Lena would do anything, as often as she could.

So, if there's a spring in her step when she enters the CatCo building later that day, she can blame the children at the hospital for her extra cheer, guilt-free.

She stops at a few offices on her way, signing a few things here, checking in on a few things there. She brushes by James with a courteous, "Mister Olsen," and doesn't think twice about the strange look he gives her before replying in kind, and enters her office to find Kara Danvers patiently waiting on one of the sofas.

She stands when she sees her enter and Lena grins so widely she thinks her face might crack. There's got to be a limit as to how much smiling the human face can take in one day, surely.

"Kara." Lena sounds breathless all of a sudden. "I wasn't expecting to see you. Don't you have today off?"

Kara's lips part in an open-mouthed smile that shows rows of pearly-white teeth and she ducks her head, blonde hair bouncing over her shoulder.

"Ah, yes," Kara nods, squinting at Lena as she lifts her gaze. "I do." She lifts a hand to adjust her glasses and Lena drops her handbag onto the couch behind her before taking a step closer to Kara. Sky-blue eyes flit away momentarily, dropping a few inches before shooting back up to meet Lena's. Kara huffs a nervous laugh. "I um, was in the neighbourhood?"

"Really, Kara?" Then it's Lena's turn to laugh, even as she wonders what on earth is going on. She watches Kara's gaze drop again. "You can do better than that." Light eyebrows knit together before Kara's eyes return to Lena's, but they're there for less than three seconds before they drift again. "I wouldn't say staring at my chest is better, though," she comments, dryly. "More neanderthalic, really." Kara's whole head snaps up at that, her attention rigid and focused on Lena's face as she cheeks start to colour.

"What? No, I-I," she starts to sputter. Lena starts to smirk. "I wasn't. I wouldn't. I mean, not that, not that you aren't," Kara continues, despite herself, and Lena tilts her head slightly. "Obviously," Kara starts to laugh again, high and airy, "you **are**. I just wasn't, you know, right now." Lena hikes an eyebrow and Kara's mouth falls open. "Not that I do!"

"Kara." All it takes is Lena saying her name to get Kara to put her shovel down and the blonde presses her lips together in a thin line before pointing right at Lena's chest, prompting Lena to look down.

And promptly burst out laughing.

"Well, that explains a lot." Lena fingers the elegant piece of macaroni jewellery still hanging around her neck. "I did get a few strange looks on my way here. More so than usual," she adds, dryly.

"Is this a new thing you're trying out?" Kara manages, blush receding. "A line of jewellery? Luthor-chic?"

"More like Madeline-chic, actually," Lena chuckles. She lets the necklace fall back to rest against her and takes in the sight of the woman before her. Standing anxiously a few feet away, hands slipped into the back pockets of her jeans, blinking wildly at her. "I'll tell you all about it during the date you're about to ask me on." Kara's expression becomes panicked, then clears, and she returns the smile that Lena is aiming at her. "Finally."


End file.
